There’s a Vancouver by-election happening right now. If you didn’t notice, I don’t blame you. Between Trump’s war on sanity and the recently called federal election, there isn’t much space left for a local election that realistically won’t change the balance of power in Vancouver and doesn’t help protect our sovereignty.
That said, I hope you will go out and vote. Especially for the OneCity candidate Lucy Maloney. She’s smart, compassionate, and has a great track record fighting for safe streets and tenant protection.
Voting day is April 5 and you can vote at any local community centre. You can also vote today (April 1) at City Hall.
But there is actually 2 council vacancies, so you have 2 votes. And that is where things get a lot harder to figure out. The first vote is easy – Lucy Maloney. For the second vote, I’ve heard smart people that I respect advocate for 3 possible options:
- Annette Reilly (Green)
- It’s replacing Adriane Carr’s seat, so makes sense to vote a Green back in
- Greens have a good record on environment and bike lanes (better than COPE)
- Reilly is well spoken
- Sean Orr (COPE)
- Orr is a firebrand and will hold ABC’s feet to the fire
- COPE has a strong by-election team working to get the vote out, possibly stronger than Greens even though Orr and COPE got their butts kicked last election
- No one – Just Lucy Maloney
- You don’t have to pick a second candidate (vote plumping)
- If you think Maloney and OneCity is far superior to everyone else, using your second vote risks that person winning over your top choice
In an ideal world, this wouldn’t be so complicated. There would be one obvious choice. If OneCity had run 2 candidates it would be easy. If COPE had sat this out, it would be easy. But the left-wing parties, as hard as they tried, couldn’t come up with a good solution. So we ended up with this ugly compromise where each party ran a single candidate.
I haven’t voted yet, but right now my plan is to vote for Lucy Maloney + No One. It’s not an easy choice for me. In past elections I have used very single vote. But I’m thinking ahead to the next 2026 general election. If we want to replace Ken Sim and ABC, we need a single united alternative. I believe OneCity is best party to be that alternative, and the best way to make that clear to everyone is a decisive by-election result on April 5. Otherwise, 2026 will be another case of a united ABC fending off a fractured opposition.
More Resources
If you’re looking to find out more about the candidates, here are some resources I recommend:
- Cambie Report interviews with all the candidates
- Annette Reilly was late and is for supporters only
- HUB Cycling mid-term report card
- CAPE survey
- Vancouver Public Space Network survey
Canadian Veggie 